


Off the Record

by WriterGirl128



Series: Falling Slowly [2]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Awkward Conversations, Best Friends, Canon compliant-ish, Dorks in Almost Love, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Impromptu series ayyyyy, Mostly Fluff, Pining, Secrets, Slow Burn, Training, super slow burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-17
Updated: 2015-02-17
Packaged: 2018-03-13 10:32:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3378281
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WriterGirl128/pseuds/WriterGirl128
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A soft flush settled over Iris’s cheeks as she realized what she’d said. Barry, too, suddenly felt the weight of his own confession, and damn it, they had been doing so well at not making the whole “I’m in love with my best friend who happens to have a boyfriend” thing awkward.<br/>“I-I’m interested in what you can do,” Iris stammered, clarifying with a wince. “The whole, uh—speed. Thing.”<br/>"Right."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Off the Record

**Author's Note:**

> So...voila! Ask and you shall receive. Please disregard any and all fallacies when it comes to the whole "Mach" speed stuff. I am in no way, shape, or form informed or qualified to write about physics and actually know what the frick frack I'm actually talking about, so there's that. My bad. Unbeta'd, so all mistakes are mine!

Barry Allen has only really had two huge secrets in his life. The first one was that he spent his evenings running around the city at hundreds of miles per hour, saving people as the Flash, because he was struck by lightning and somehow woke up nine months later with super speed and also abs. The second was that he was horribly, painfully, irrevocably in love with his best friend, and has been for as long as he could remember. He couldn’t remember ever not being a little in love with Iris West. Two secrets.

And now…well, now Iris knew both of them.

At first, Barry was nervous. Maybe it was because of the guilt that coiled uneasily in his gut whenever he thought about her. Which was a lot. He hated the betrayed look in her eyes when she had caught them—and more than that, he hated the fact that _he_ caused it. It was his fault. He should never have lied to her like that, and he hated the fact that he’d hurt her so much.

He hadn’t meant to. He was trying to protect her. Still, he understood her anger—hell, he’d be furious too, if he was in her position. And he understood her fear, too. He didn’t want to imagine a life without Iris in it, couldn’t imagine how he’d cope if she had been ripped away from him out of nowhere. And it must’ve been worse for her, because she didn’t have to _imagine_ it. It was her reality.

He could see that Iris was still angry with him.  They’d be watching a movie or getting coffee at Jitters and something in her expression would change, something in her eyes that was far away but also very much in the present. Her lips would tighten, just a little, and she’d drop her gaze and grow quiet. It came and went, sometimes longer than others, but she would always come out of it and smile at him a little. Barry loved her for that.

But because of the slight tension already clouding their interactions, Barry tried his best to refrain from talking about anything Flash-related with her around. She’d bring it up sometimes (usually when she went into that passively-angry zone), and he’d kind of dance around the subject with his words until her face relaxed and that tense little line left her brow.

He hadn’t expected things to go back to normal once she knew the truth about what he did. He had, however, expected that the weight he felt on his chest would lighten, even a little, when he had no more secrets to keep from her. He’d expected to feel _better._ Instead, he felt like he was walking on eggshells.

About a week after she found them in the warehouse, Barry was packing up his bag after work when he heard her voice, happy and bright and so _Iris_ (pre-revelation) that he felt a smile creep onto his face.

“Mr. Allen,” she nearly sang, coming up behind him and putting her hands on his shoulders.  “I have a proposition for you.”

He raised an eyebrow at that, zipping up his bag. “Oh yeah?” he returned easily. “And what would that be?”

She squeezed his shoulders, before turning to face him, smiling almost mischievously. “I propose,” she started, putting her hands on his shoulders again, “that you and me talk about whatever we want to talk about, and that we don’t deflect topics like metahumans and superpowers, because all that’s doing is making things awkward.”

Something like relief washed over Barry for a moment, and he felt himself grin. Then it faltered, however, and doubt tightened in his chest. “If…” he pushed her on, knowing deep down there was more to this proposition.

Iris leaned back against his desk, then, crossing her arms over her chest. “If you let me come the next time you go Flash training.”

Barry nodded, knowing it would be something like that. “Iris,” he sighed, “you don’t have to—”

“I know I don’t,” she cut in, nodding. “I know I don’t have to. But I want to.” Barry frowned at that, not really getting it. The only reason he’d been refraining from Flash-talk around her was because she always seemed to revisit that anger when he did. Now she wants to go with him to his training?

Iris sighed. “Look, Barry. Being angry with you? It’s…” she trailed off and shook her head, laughing a little. “It’s exhausting. I _miss_ you, Bear. I miss us. And I hate the tension between us.”

Barry nodded in agreement, his churning stomach calming at the words. Iris hated it too. _I miss us_. Barry’s already rapidly beating heart sped up—maybe there was hope yet. “So do I,” he said sincerely.

“I know you do,” Iris replied, and she was smiling a little, honestly. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m still angry with you. I just—I’ve been thinking about it, and I think the reason I’m so angry might be because I’m _scared_. You’ve always been a constant, Barry—my adorable nerd best friend who geeks out over zombie fungus, right? Not someone who I was expecting to see running into burning buildings and stopping armed robberies and fighting superpowered metahumans. It’s like I can’t connect the two of you. And I think that seeing you do your thing at training might help, and could make me a little less scared.”

Barry raised an eyebrow at her at that. “Iris, you’ve seen me use my speed before,” he reminded her gently.

Iris shook her head, though. “Not really,” she denied. “I’ve seen _the Flash_ use his speed. Not you, not Barry Allen. Which, okay, I know you’re the same person, but it’s the _principle_ of the thing. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

Barry thought about it for a moment, and it actually made sense. She’d even said it—she was angry with him because he thought it was okay to risk his life without her knowing about it. Maybe if she knew how capable he was, she’d be less afraid of losing him again. And—maybe—if she was less afraid, she’d be less angry.

She still saw him as her dorky best friend. She didn’t see the Flash running into danger, she saw nerdy Barry Allen running into danger. It made Barry suddenly feel twenty pounds lighter. It was like with every word out of Iris’ mouth, Barry loved her that much more.

He nodded a little, smiling. “Okay,” he said. “Yeah, okay. I’m actually headed over there in a little while, if you want to…?”

Iris grinned. “It’s a date.”

 

 

Two hours and a dislocated shoulder later, Iris looked adequately horrified yet equally as assured. “Oh my God, Barry,” she exhaled, wincing along with Barry as Caitlin set his shoulder into place with a _pop._ “I can’t believe you made it out of that with _just_ a dislocated shoulder.”

“Yeah,” he agreed a little breathlessly, wincing as he stretched. “Come on, Cisco—step it up.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” Cisco assured him, grinning, and dear God, it was never a good thing when Cisco grinned like that. “You’re playing with the big toys next.”

Iris’ eyebrows shot up at that. “You mean there’s more? More than missiles, exploding boomerangs and robotic _machine guns_?”

Cisco wiggled his eyebrows at that. “Hell yeah. This one’s got _lasers,_ man!” Cisco returned his gaze to Barry. “You’ve got about half an hour, dude. I need to fix some of the tech and Cisco it a bit more, if you know what I mean.  I want to try and get you up to 950 by the end of the week.”

Barry’s eyes widened. “Cisco, if I go 950 miles an hour and hit _anything,_ I’m toast.”

Cisco grinned. “Then don’t hit anything,” he said simply, clapping a hand on his good shoulder before turning away and joining Caitlin at the table they had set up.

Iris’ eyes grew worried, casting a glance at Barry. “Bear, please tell me this isn’t how you’ve been spending all of your free time lately.”

Barry chuckled, wincing as he stood. “Sorry. No more lying, though, remember?”

Iris nodded. “Right,” she said, and watched him as he rolled his shoulder a few times. She winced. “Doesn’t that hurt?”

“It’s not so bad,” he assured her. “I heal fast.”

It must have been news to Iris, because first she blinked in surprise, but covered it up quickly with a look of nonchalant intrigue. She watched Barry for a moment, then, and something in her expression changed—something more curious, hungry for information. “Uh huh,” she said slowly, nodding.

Barry sighed, leaning back on his heels. “Okay, Iris, go for it.”

She looked at him with eyes way too innocent to actually be innocent. “What do you mean?”

Barry laughed, shaking his head. “You’ve got your reporter face on,” he teased easily.

She smiled at that, a real smile, one that made the corners of her eyes crinkle a little. God, Barry loved that smile, those eyes. “Well…” she started slowly, before biting her lip. “Ever since I started working at the paper, I _have_ been dying to ask the Flash—you—a few things. And we haven’t really, you know. Talked about it, much.”

That made Barry pause for a second, and he felt his smile flicker. For a while there, it was almost as if he’d forgotten that her job had basically turned into investigating him. He bit his lip, dropping his gaze to his feet for a second. “Iris?” he said carefully, and when he looked back up, her smile had faded too, as if she had picked up on his unease. “We don’t need to have the whole you-can’t-tell-anyone-about-this conversation, right?”

At the question, her eyes turned sad, and guilt twisted in Barry’s stomach because he never wanted to see her be anything less than happy. It was like a gut-driven instinct—make sure Iris is happy. Happy and safe. And he felt horrible because he’s been really sucking at that, lately. After a moment, Iris shook her head. “Of course not, Barry,” she assured him, her voice honest. “I could never do that to you. You should know that.”

Barry nodded then, quickly, wanting to erase that almost wounded look on Iris’s face—the way the corners of her pretty lips quivered, the way she dropped her gaze a little, so that her eyelashes looked like perfect little crescents on her cheeks. “I know,” he said, and she looked back up at him. “I know you wouldn’t, it’s just…” Then he trailed off, sighing. “You’re a great reporter, Iris. You are. You took this theory that literally no one believed in and proved that it was real. And now you have a shot at a huge newspaper, and I don’t want this whole—” he broke off, gesturing between the two of them and around them at the training setup, “—thing to mess that up for you, but there’s also a lot of this I would really appreciate staying, you know. Off the record?”

Understanding dawned in Iris’s eyes, and that hurt look she wore was replaced with something that looked suspiciously like amusement. “Barry Allen,” she sighed, putting her hands on his arms the way she’s always done, whenever he said something even mildly ridiculous. “For someone so fast with such a big brain, you can be so slow sometimes.” And then she smiled at him a little, and the pressure of her hands tightening as she squeezed his arms through his suit sent pleasant shivers—like sparks—up his arms. _God_ her eyes were beautiful. “Barry, you are more important to me than some stupid job. And, okay, maybe I was a tad obsessive about the Flash at first—”

“A tad?” Barry cut in, stifling a grin.

Iris hit him in the arm. “Fine,” she admitted, “ _completely_ obsessive, but you know, who wouldn't be? Some masked guy, speeding around the city and helping people. It’s incredible, what you do. But I would never risk our relationship over some _story,_ Barry. And I don’t have questions for you because you’re the Flash and I want to write a story for the paper—I have questions because you’re my best friend and I’m _interested_ in you.”

A soft flush settled over Iris’s cheeks, then, as she realized what she’d said. Barry, too, suddenly felt the weight of his confession, and damn it, they had been doing so well at not making the whole “I’m in love with my best friend who happens to have a boyfriend” thing awkward.

“I-I’m interested in what you can do,” Iris stammered, clarifying with a wince. “The whole, uh—speed. Thing.”

Barry nodded at that, dropping his gaze to his feet. “Right,” he agreed, his heart sinking stupidly even though he totally _knew_ that was what she meant. She didn’t mean she was _interested_ interested in him. Of course not. That was ridiculous. Wasn’t it?

There was a moment of slightly awkward silence, before Iris cleared her throat. “So…” she pressed, and when Barry lifted his gaze, she had her eyebrows raised. “Are questions allowed?”

She had that look in her brown eyes, again, that need for knowledge look and Barry couldn’t help but resign because that was one of the many things he loved so much about her—her determination, her drive, her need to _understand_ things. Not scientific things, like Barry, but more _relative_ things, things that held an active role in her life. He admired that about her.

So Barry bit his lip. “Off the record?”

He could tell Iris was holding back a smile when she nodded again—she knew she’d already won. “Totally, completely, one hundred and fifty percent off the record.”

Then Barry sighed, nodding in resignation. “Okay,” he said, and crossed his arms, raising his eyebrows at her. “Lay ‘em on me.”

Needless to say, Iris had a _lot_ of questions. Everything from “How did it even happen?” to “How did you do that thing to your voice?” (to which she was very intrigued by the vibration answer, and made Barry demonstrate the skill with various body parts of his body), to “So is _everything_ faster now?”

Barry, who had been taking a sip of water during that one, ended up choking. “Uh—you mean…?” he sputtered, and at her expectant raise of an eyebrow, felt his cheeks flush. “Er, I haven’t really, um… since the accident.”

“Wait,” Iris said almost gleefully, “you’re telling me you haven’t had sex since you woke up from the coma? _Really_?”

“Voice, Iris!” Barry shushed her, his face hotter than ever. “If Cisco hears you say that, he’ll never let me hear the end of it.”

“Not even with Felicity?” Iris pushed on, ignoring Barry.

Barry sighed, then. “No, Iris. I’ve told you—Felicity is _just_ a friend. Besides, she’s in love with someone else.”

And then Iris’s expression dropped, and she seemed so genuinely sad about it that it made Barry’s heart hurt. “Oh, Bear—I’m sorry. You guys seemed great together.”

Barry shrugged, though he couldn’t help the twinge of sadness he felt. “It’s okay. We just decided it was better that we were friends, is all. It’s no big deal.” Then he lowered his voice. “Now can we please stop talking about my nonexistent sex life? This suit has microphones, and as far as we know, Cisco and Caitlin could be back there listening to our entire conversation.”

He turned his head to look back at them—and as soon as he did, Caitlin dropped her head back to her work. Cisco, on the other hand, didn’t even pretend to hide the fact that he was listening. He just twirled the lollipop in his mouth and raised his eyebrows at Barry.

Barry sighed, rubbing the back of his neck as he turned back to Iris. “Thanks so much for that.”

Iris winced. “Sorry.” Then her eyebrows drew together, looking at Cisco, watching him as he altered the missile launcher. “Hey, what are you training _for_ anyways?” she asked, returning her gaze to Barry’s. “It seems like this is an awful lot of work for facing off with a couple of metahumans.”

Suddenly, it was like there was a dark cloud hanging over Barry’s head. It was some odd, confusing mixture of guilt and pain and hatred, and he wished more than anything that he hid it well enough that Iris didn’t see it. Barry swallowed, feeling his expression drop a little, and his gaze fell to his feet. “I need to be faster,” he admitted quietly, before looking back up at her. “It isn’t just about the other metahumans. I need to be faster.”

Iris looked confused at that, though she picked up on his shift in mood and her expression grew more serious. “Barry, I don’t think I understand,” she said, though her voice wasn’t unkind—it was gentle, even. “Why does someone who can run faster than the speed of sound need to run any faster? You’re already the fastest man alive.”

Barry bit his lip, again dropping his gaze, but only for a second this time. “No I’m not,” he told her, and shook his head. “There’s someone else.”

Iris looked like she’d been slapped. “There’s someone _faster_ than you?” she asked. At his nod, she shook her head. “I…I don’t understand. How…?”

“I don’t know,” Barry replied honestly. “But he is. And he’s here. Or—he was. He could be anywhere, by now.” The next part was the hard part—but no more secrets, right? “Iris, he wears a yellow suit, and when he runs he creates red lightning.”

It took Iris a second to put it together, and for that second, she just looked at him in desperate confusion. Then realization dawned in her eyes, and her hand covered her mouth. “Oh, God, Bear—the man in the yellow suit. _The_ Man in the Yellow Suit? The one who…?” She didn’t finish, but she didn’t need to. Barry was already nodding. Iris’s other hand joined her first, over her mouth in disbelief, before fluttering down in front of her. “He was here? In Central City?”

Barry nodded, wincing. “Yeah. And he got away because I wasn’t fast enough to catch him.”

Iris reached a trembling hand out to him, taking his in her own. “Barry, that’s not your fault. You didn’t know—”

“There’s more to it,” Barry cut her off, though it wasn’t harshly. He sighed. “When Joe first found out about me, saw what I could do, he realized that what I told him about the night my mom died wasn’t as impossible as he thought it was. So we kind of reopened the case—under the radar, obviously. Looking, rereading, searching. Anything we could to try and get my dad out of jail. And one night when Joe was alone, he came. He must’ve somehow found out we were trying to expose him.”

Iris’s eyes widened. “He threatened Dad?” she said in a small voice, which made Barry’s heart lurch painfully. Iris never spoke in a voice like that—she had too big, too beautiful of a personality to hold it in a small voice like that.

Barry shook his head sadly, and he squeezed her hand. “No, Iris,” he said gently. “He threatened _you_. He wrote ‘stop or else’ on the wall, and underneath it, there was a picture or you with a knife through it.”

Iris, clearly trying to hide how much that scared her, swallowed almost audibly. “That’s part of the reason why you didn’t tell me,” she said quietly, understanding. “Because of threats like that.” It was more of a statement than a question, but Barry nodded anyways.

“And that’s why I’m training so hard. If we have any hope of stopping this guy, then we need someone who can at least keep up with him.”

“Which is where you come in.”

“Right. Or, uh—almost right. That guy, Iris, whoever he is—he’s really fast. And that’s coming from me.”

Iris winced. “How fast is really fast?” she asked nervously.

Cisco, who had been arranging launchers for the next round of training, perked up. “We’re estimating he goes around Mach 1 ½ , right, but seeing as how last time Barry was going a little above Mach 1 the relative rates, if we can assume he’s getting faster as Barry does—”

“Around a thousand miles per hour, give or take,” Barry translated, cutting Cisco off before he started a full out rant. “Which is about a hundred and fifty miles per hour more than I’ve ever _comfortably_ run,” he continued, shooting Cisco a look on the word comfortably (Cisco had a thing about sonic booms).

“Right,” Cisco agreed, not seeming bothered at all by the dig. “Which is why you have thirty seconds before my toys turn on and try to kill you again. Gotta go hard or go home, am I right?”

Barry rolled his eyes, before turning to Iris. “Can we finish this later? Get some dinner and talk?”

Iris smiled at that. “Definitely,” she agreed. “Now you’d better go—I don’t think Cisco would appreciate you getting blood on his suit.”

And as Barry sped away, down the abandoned-runway-makeshift-training-area, he couldn’t help but grin at the “See? Even _she_ says it’s my suit!” that Cisco called after him.

Iris came training with him again later that week, and three times the next. She was getting along great with Cisco and Caitlin, even if she didn’t totally understand all of the scientific parts of what they did. Little by little, they filled her in on the things they’ve been doing—the different metahumans they’ve faced, the way they all connect back to the particle accelerator explosion. But that didn’t mean they stopped doing their normal Barry-and-Iris hangouts. They still went for coffee some days and on others they found themselves at the movies or at dinner. They fell back into the swing of their friendship.

It was like the more Iris knew, the less afraid she was—and with that, the anger that Barry still saw in her faded, a little bit at a time. She didn’t totally forgive them for lying—and Barry suspected there would always be part of her that was angry with them for it, a part that was a little betrayed and a little hurt and a lot afraid. But it was okay, because that part of her wasn’t showing up in silences anymore, wasn’t creating tensions every time they saw each other. It was all Barry could hope for, honestly. He’d gotten his best friend back, as impossible as it seemed.

Then again, the word impossible had kind of lost its meaning.

Iris continued to write about the Flash—though it was all sightings, rumors, buzz-on-the-street type things. She did what she had to in order to keep her job, but she never said anything about the Flash that would give away just how well she knew the person behind the mask. Barry was in too much awe of her to realize just how much care Iris put into the words she chose, quietly painting him a hero in a city that once sent a task force after him.

And while Barry focused on not letting his feelings for Iris get in the way of their friendship, he was oblivious to the way Iris would look at him when he wasn’t paying attention, with admiration in her brown eyes. He didn’t notice how sometimes her touch would linger on his skin, or how she’d fiddle with the wedding band he’d given her and space out, eyes far away somewhere in a world of wonder.

While Barry Allen focused on trying not to be totally in love with his best friend, he couldn’t see that his best friend was slowly falling in love with him right back.

Oh, the sweet, sweet irony.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to the wonderful peeps who asked for more and gave me motivation to continue with this series! Let me know what you think!


End file.
